Govt says ‘No’ to Coal India employees on pay-parity

Kolkata: Putting a stop to a long-drawn demand from Coal India Limited (CIL) employees, the Centre has said a clear 'No' to some 20,000 executives who had been demanding that their company's pay scale should be the same as that of Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), Indian Oil and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL). The government rejected the demand, saying that the current salaries were in line with the Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) guidelines.

Why has the Centre rejected the proposal?

The government told Coal India employees that their demand has been rejected after consultation with the DPE, which is responsible for prescribing pay scales for executives on the basis of recommendations of the Committee of Secretaries on the report of the 3rd Pay Revision Committee, which has been notified after Cabinet approval. "Hence, Coal India's proposal being not in line with extant department of public enterprise guidelines on pay revision does not allow any deviation in the number and structure of pay scales," the government said in a letter to Coal India.

The backdrop

The employees had also asked Coal India to ensure that salaries of workmen do not exceed that of executives. CIL senior workers are getting paid more than some executives because the PSU revises the salaries of workmen more frequently. For instance, Coal India hiked the salaries of its executives, which resulted in an additional outgo of Rs 800 crore every year. This raised the pay scale of entry-level executives from Rs 16,400 – Rs 40,500 to Rs 40,000 – Rs 1,40,000 per month. The dearness allowance of 117 percent was merged with the basic salary after the hike.

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